Bringing all the Ambition and Operational Rigor to Louisville—an Employee Spotlight with DCL Logistics Operations Manager, Rosa Hurtado
At DCL Logistics, our business is to serve our clients with the best logistics support possible. And we are able to do so, day-in and day-out, because of our dedicated and hardworking team. A core value at DCL Logistics is “People First: We recognize our employees as our most important asset and that investing in them pays dividends for the business.”
Rosa Hurtado, the Senior Operations Manager at our new Louisville Facility, lives and breathes this value of “People First”. Her main role is to provide inspired leadership for the Louisville team. She leads by example and has curated a company culture that encourages top performance and high morale. Having worked at DCL since 1990, she certainly knows the deep roots and values of this company, and she has successfully brought them to Kentucky. Rosa was eager to share what it was like building-out the newest facility in Louisville, how she leads her team to deliver for DCL customers everyday, and the ins-and-outs of why DCL has such lasting power.
What’s the Secret Ingredient at DCL?
Opening a new facility in Louisville, Kentucky this year, the DCL leadership team knew it would be a considerable effort to bring the ambitious and service-oriented culture of DCL to a new site.
“I came from being the Distribution Manager for our facility in Ontario, California. I’ve built this team here by observing the whole organization, identifying talented employees, and placing them in key positions. I look for employees that believe in DCL’s culture, their drive and desire to do it right. My favorite part of this job is seeing the joy on their face when the job is done, the satisfaction and love what they do—it is contagious.”
Rosa leads a team to execute near perfect orders and operations everyday. Her reputation at DCL is that she will stay as long as it takes, working alongside her team, to get things done and making sure they are done right. But the true secret, Rosa says, is that DCL is a family, a tight-knit team who care deeply about seeing each other succeed. “We are actually a family. My grandpa worked here, my mom worked here. I’ve worked here since I was 16, my oldest daughter now works here too. Not only do we care about our customers, but we also care about each other. It doesn’t matter which department you work in, every employee cares about the other employees. Nobody here fails—if someone sees a problem, someone steps in to play that role, and help out—which translates to: nothing in the customer requirements is overseen and not taken care of. You can see that everybody around you takes part in a common goal, which is serving our customers.”
Bringing the Operational Rigor to Kentucky
The Louisville facility officially opened this summer, but small-batch operations have been going on for months—and it’s been years of preparation to build the site from the ground up. Rosa recounts, “I came to visit six times before being here full time; I’ve been here for about a year, now. We moved buildings at least seven times in Ontario, but this is my first encounter working in a building with a brand new facility, and the experience has been awesome. It’s been exciting, but honestly, it was challenging to find people who fit DCL’s ambitious culture.”
In the beginning there were a lot of personnel issues, which caused errors and inconsistencies. Some of the initial staff were not accustomed to the DCL work ethic. “They would come in after 9am, and leave at 4pm” Rosa says. “They just didn’t care in the same way. But now I have managers who will come in on Saturday, or Sunday. Of course what we do here takes long hours, but it also comes with the satisfaction that we did the best job we could do.”
Providing Value for Customers
In the Louisville facility the team is working on more automated processes. They have been successful with small quantities, and are working toward doing it for longer, and larger orders. “Now we’re asking: Can we do it faster and error proof?” Rosa says. “We’re looking into robotics now too. It’s very, very new. But we are always looking into bringing new technology. Again not only for our purpose of saving labor or money, but to better service our customers.”
“This is a company that does not stand still, this is a company that evolves, that predicts the future, adopts technology. Most people here are shocked when I say DCL stands for ‘disk copy labs’ since that’s what we used to do—copy diskettes. That’s what I used to do!” Rosa says proudly.
The bottom line is that Louisville is for our customers, Rosa explains. “What we do is not based on us making more money; it’s based on customer needs and requirements. We can do 100 orders per hour in one station, but then, if a customer asks if we can do 1000, we try and figure out how to do it.”
Every expansion that DCL has been for the benefit of our customers—to provide more capabilities, greater opportunities, and better service. Rosa continues, “It’s that ability to look forward, into the future, and not be complacent about the present—that’s why this company has survived for so many years and evolved so successfully.”
If you looking for a 3PL partner to work with we would love to hear from you. You can read DCL’s list of services to learn more, or check out the many companies we work with to ensure great logistics support. Send us a note to connect about how we can help your company grow.
